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OMSquee: The Surprising Place Retired Folks Find Romance in China

IKEA is fantastic for finding inexpensive furniture, grabbing some cheap snacks and their catalogs are all sorts of entertaining. But shoppers in some IKEA locations are experiencing an entirely different trend that has nothing to do with design.

For mature IKEA customers in Shanghai, it’s all about romance! According to the Wall Street Journal, retired and elderly people head to the local IKEA once a week in droves to socialize and exchange digits. These “weekly romance sessions” bring in anywhere from 70 to 700 mature shoppers; they gather in the store’s large café and gab and flirt over the complimentary coffee given out to customers who hold IKEA membership cards. Like many of her peers, a retired woman who spoke with WSJ spoke with “doesn't think it is appropriate to scope out men at bars, clubs or Karaoke joints. That's why she goes to IKEA.” But it’s not just romance and free java that’s on the menu. Many of these older folks are also making new friends.

I’m absolutely head over heels for this bit of news! Isn’t it adorable? However, the suits at IKEA aren’t nearly as thrilled; apparently the older singles often leave litter behind once they wrap up their mingling. Whoops.

Who else is swooning over this sweet news? What are some unusual places to flirt in your hometown? And have you and a boyfriend ever spent the afternoon strolling through IKEA? It can be a lot of fun!